The Malik Report

FYI: The Columbus Blue Jackets defeated the Dallas Stars 3-1 on Thursday night, so the Detroit Red Wings (23-16-and-8, 54 points, 21 regulation-or-OT wins) will have to at least earn one point in Saturday's road game against the Stars--because Columbus (23-17-and-7, 53 points, 18 ROWs) can max out at 55 points if they defeat Nashville at home.

In such a situation, Columbus would have 24 wins and a maximum of 19 regulation-or-OT wins, but even with an OT or shootout loss in Dallas, the Wings would have 21 ROWs, so they'd win the tiebreaker.

Columbus takes 3-1 lead with minute to spare in regulation, so safe to say no clinching tonight for #Red Wings.

The Detroit Red Wings' 5-2 win over the Nashville Predators began with the team frustrating the hell out of its mostly-full rink's worth of playoff-ready fans at Joe Louis Arena and ended properly, with a standing ovation in the home finale...

And somewhere in between, despite the fact that the Columbus Blue Jackets could force the Wings to beat Dallas outright to earn a playoff spot, the Wings slowly but surely found their form, found themselves and just absolutely dismantled the Nashville Predators.

Mr. Hockey: the Gordie Howe Story will air on the CBC this Sunday at 8 PM EDT, and will air on the Hallmark Channel on Sunday, May 4th at 9 PM (before going straight-to-DVD on Tuesday, May 11th). Ahead of the film's debut, the actor playing Gordie Howe, Michael Shanks, has made the rounds discussing his role in the film, but as the movie's premiere approaches, the Canadian Press's Victoria Ahearn notes that the movie's about the partnership between Mr. and Mrs. Hockey as much as it is about the elder Howe's time spent playing for the Houston Aeros aside his sons, Mark and Marty:

"Gordie was this giant on the ice and this giant figure in the hockey world but he'd spent so much of his life devoted to that, that I think even in their later years without her he was kind of lost because she handled everything else," Vancouver actor Michael Shanks, who plays Howe in the film, said in a telephone interview.That's one of the reasons the movie is dedicated to her. It demonstrates this unsung hero, Mrs. Hockey, who was really where everything flowed back into."

"She was doing things that women just didn't do at that time," said Hamilton-born "Beverly Hills 90210" star Kathleen Robertson, who plays Colleen. "She was very involved and very influential in all the business dealings of what it was to be Gordie Howe in that time period. She was very protective of her sons, she basically negotiated their deals, she was their manager and she was really smart and really tough."

Updated 10x with the Wings' game-day video at 4:06 PM: The Detroit Red Wings still face a must-win situation against the Nashville Predators tonight (7:30 PM EDT, FSD/FS Tennessee/97.1 FM) despite defeating the Los Angeles Kings last night, and at least initially, the morning skate gave no indications as to Johan Franzen's status for this evening...

Very optional practice this morning at JLA. Bertuzzi, Tootoo and Samuelsson at forward. Colaiacovo, White and Lashoff on defense.

The theory goes something like this: as the Red Wings' 3-1 win over the Los Angeles Kings gives the 22-16-and-8 Wings both 52 points and 20 regulation-or-OT wins, if the Wings earn a win over the Nashville Predators tonight (7:30 PM, FSD/FS Tennessee/97.1 FM) and the Dallas Stars (48 points, 20 ROWs) defeat the Columbus Blue Jackets (51 points, 17 ROWs), the Wings will make the playoffs outright, and won't have to worry about Saturday's regular season-ending match-up with the Stars (and all three teams have 2 games left to play).

But the Red Wings don't want to count on anybody but themselves controling their playoff fate, especially playing on back-to-back nights against a spoiler-happy Predators team--possibly without the services of Johan Franzen--and especially given the way the Blue Jackets have been winng, Detroit still wants to "win out."

There's no doubt that the Wings received an assist from the NHL in the form of Dustin Brown's suspension before tanling with the Brown-less Kings, and it's Brown's suspension that the Los Angeles Times' Lisa Dillman's recap focuses upon...

If you missed it in the quick take, Red Wings forward Johan Franzen suffered some sort of injury ("undisclosed") during the Red Wings' 3-1 win over the Los Angeles Kings, and he's iffy for tomorrow's game against Nashville, as MLive's Ansar Khan reports:

Coach Mike Babcock and general manager Ken Holland said Franzen's status for Thursday's home finale vs. Nashville will be determined in the morning.

“He's been real good for us,'' Babcock said. "He didn't finish the game, but hopefully he'll be fine for tomorrow.''

Babcock added, “Don't know a whole bunch. They just took him off the bench, or made him sit on the bench. I couldn't use him down the stretch. I'll find out tomorrow.''

If I were to guess, I'd go with Franzen possibly tweaking his hip flexors toward the end of the game. But that's just a guess.

The Detroit Red Wings may have made their biggest "statement" of the season when they needed it the most. They may have played the best playoff hockey they have in over a year, defeating the Los Angeles Kings 3-1 on a night that the team desperately needed to remain in control of its fate.

But it didn't start out "pretty," at least as far as finishing was concerned.

The AP's Larry Lage may have had to elbow his way to his laptop given the number of scribes in attendance for tonight's game at Joe Louis Arena, but he did so in order to drop a heavy hint that the Wings' long-term future does not involve their current rink:

The Detroit Red Wings will play in a new arena some season in the future. It's not if, but when and yet Chris Ilitch doesn't know or want to say much about it.

"Everybody is working hard and there's positive progress," the president and CEO of Ilitch Holdings told The Associated Press after Thursday's Detroit Economic Club meeting.

What's next in the process?

"It's tough to say," he said. "I'd prefer not to make any predictions and just keep working away and continue to do our due diligence and see what we can put together."

I'm going to raise an eyebrow regarding Lage's note that the $12.8 million in yearly tax subsidies the Wings were awarded by the Downtown Development Authority as it was my understanding that the money came from "general fund" dollars, not tax money that was tabbed for education, but that bone of contention remains an, "It depends on how you read the legislation" wrinkle.

Mr. Hockey: The Gordie Howe Story will air on the CBC this Sunday, May 28th at 8 PM EDT, and it will air on the Hallmark Channel on Sunday, May 4th at 9 PM (actor Michael Shanks plays Howe in the movie chronicling Howe's comeback with the Houston Aeros, and his website offers oodes of information regarding and articles about the film, which will go straight to WalMart DVD on April 6th), and the CBC posted a fantastic interview with Howe from 1978 as part of the lead-up to the film's premiere:

Updated 16x at 3:08 PM: The Detroit Red Wings face a stiff challenge in battling against the Los Angeles Kings tonight (7:30 PM EDT, NBCSN on TV and online/TSN2/97.1 FM), and the Wings hit the ice just before 10:30 AM for their morning skate with Todd Bertuzzi in tow:

All signs are pointing to Todd Bertuzzi returning to the #RedWings lineup tonight against the Kings.

About The Malik Report

The Malik Report is a destination for all things Red Wings-related. I offer biased, perhaps unprofessional-at-times and verbose coverage of my favorite team, their prospects and developmental affiliates. I've joined the Kukla's Korner family with five years of blogging under my belt, and I hope you'll find almost everything you need to follow your Red Wings at a place where all opinions are created equal and we're all friends, talking about hockey and the team we love to follow.